Crafting Adventures With A Pint Sized Wild Man

Counting Worm

My adorable son refuses to accept the number four as an entity and I’m feeling especially lazy this morning. Combining these two factors, we settled on a ridiculously easy counting craft today. This counting worm could not be simpler to create and is super adorable. Given the fact that all that’s asked of your toddler is gluing the worm’s body on top of the matching numbers, it’s a fairly quick craft and would work perfectly for those times when you find yourself with an hour to kill and an inability to bring yourself to play trains even one more time.

What I love most about this craft is the fact that it incorporates a number of skill sets into a single, easy activity. You and your toddler work on matching numbers, counting and fine motor skills with almost no cleanup involved. To stretch out the learning experience, Mateo and I practiced matching the numbers and counting the circles a few times before gluing the circles on. We also rolled around on the floor and pretended to be worms for a few minutes – but that’s entirely optional. He enjoyed the entire activity and asked to hang the worm above the crib. I’m calling that a win.

Side Note: You’ll notice that the three on our worm is upside down. I caught some flak from my mom for not noticing this. Let it be known, I noticed and chose not to correct him. To the best of my ability, I try to keep these activities fun for him. I don’t want them to feel like chores and I don’t want them to be a demonstration of my artistic ability. Therefore, I do my best to offer minimal corrections to his placement of materials. If we are making a worm and he tries to glue the circle on the top of the paper or on the back, I’ll laugh and say “Oh no! The worm’s sad because he’s missing a piece of his belly” and redirect him back to the correct placement. If he puts the three upside down, I mention it but don’t force a correction. He’s two. This is not school. We are having fun and learning a bit in the process. That’s my opinion. You’re entitled to yours.

Materials:

Construction paper in a few different colors. Ideally, each of the pieces of your worms belly would be a different color. We suffered a loss with one of our pieces (he tried to eat it) and green was the most available color I had in the moment. Therefore two pieces are green.

Elmer’s glue.

Sharpie marker

Directions:

Use a round object to draw 6 circles in a worm pattern. Add facial features and an antennae to the worm (older kids could easily draw these themselves). Label each of the circles on the worm and circles you’ve cut out with numbers from 1-5.

Use green construction paper to cut out some grass for the bottom.

Have your child glue the grass below the worm.

Hand your child the numbered circles and help them match the numbers on the circles to the numbers on the worm. Once you’ve practiced a few times, have them glue each of the numbered circles to the corresponding parts on the worm.